Any one familiar with Foremost Lathe?

Hi, interested in woodturning. Not sure what I need but came across a chance to buy a Foremost Lathe from someone who inherited and knows nothing about it. I couldn’t find anything out this brand on the internet. The only thing going I can gather is that it is a Harbor Freight brand? But if you go to HF they have Central Machinery.

Thoughts and any other advice welcome.

9 replies so far

Foremost was not a HF brand that I know of. Foremost is apparently out of business but the lathe probably uses off the shelf bearings and pulleys. Don’t pay much for it. How much are they asking? Vaguely similar to some Craftsman lathes. The important things are does it spin true and the size of the threads and Morse taper. Taper is probably a #1 or #2 but it’s important to know which. Taper sizes can be found on the internet and are easy to measure. Just looking at the picture I’d guess the threads are 3/4-16 but that’s only a guess. If they are something uncommon it can make buying faceplates and chucks more difficult/expensive. Most common threads on lathes this size are 1-8 and 3/4-16.

This tube style lathe came with many different manufacturing or brand names. You do not say how much people asking for this lathe. Would not give more than $25 to $50 for it. If do a search for Foremost lathes HF does come up but they stopped selling their tube style version of this lathe many years ago.

From the picture do not see a threaded spindle, so not sure what Morse taper the lathe has. Parts for this lathe will be expensive if can find them.

We do not know what want to turn you can turn small stuff on a big lathe but only small stuff on a mini lathe. If you are looking for an inexpensive lathe either one of these will get you up and running. You can read reviews at their web site and here at Lumberjocks. Would not buy any of their other lathes.

Thank you for the very informative responses and saving me from making a mistake. I was going to post a side pic but since this is a pass won’t bother. However I did want to answer a few of the others.

Price – $70 but if I bought another tool they had, this might be free.

What do I want to do? Not sure where I will fall into (bowls? table legs? etc) – just seems cool to take something raw and spin something completely cool out. But I like the tip, big lathe can do small things, small lathe can’t do big things so the question is space right?

Looks like based on Wildwood’s advice – one doesn’t need a fancy branded lathe to do this as a fun hobby and that a couple of the Harbor Freights will do. On the larger HF, it is weird that it goes to 33 3/8 instead of 36?

Thank you again for the comments, I already know many times more about lathes than I did before which was zero.